Saturday, 18 June 2016

Here are the first few signatures from Creature and Droid Performers. There will be many more to come over the next few weeks.

PAGE 144

Barbara Fadden

I don't actually know the name of Barbara's character, despite the fact that most of the characters from Maz's castle have now officially been named on the www.starwars.com databank. If anyone can enlighten me, then please do. She can be seen at the bar in James Clyne's illustration on the above page and on the far left of this Annie Leibovitz Vanity Fair photo. Click for a closer look.

Getting all of the costume concept artists that worked on VII will take a while, as most of them have moved on to other movies, but I am on the case. Getting Glyn was easy though as he was a Co-Costume Designer on Rogue One. He drew Kylo straight on the page.

Here are some more of the HODs that I have collected. I've still got quite a bit of work to do to complete this page, including getting hold of Rick Carter (Co-Production Designer), Roger Guyett (ILM Visual Effects Supervisor) and Dan Mindel (Director of Photography). Thanks to Sam Leake for getting Darren Gilford to sign for me. Fortunately he's still in the UK, as the Production Designer on 'Kingsman 2'

Thursday, 16 June 2016

Those of you who know me are aware that I like to have a project or two on the go. This one is way more interesting than the usual prop gun, helmet or spaceship you would usually find on my bench.

I am collecting Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens cast and crew autographs in a copy of "The Art of The Force Awakens" I'm going for 150 in total, including UK and US Art Departments, Creatures, Costume, SFX, Set Dec, VFX, Performers, Puppeteers, Principles, Producers and Directors.

It's taken almost 3 months, but with 73 signatures in the book I'm almost half way, and having just finished the pattern for what will become a cold-cast bronze display box, I thought it would be a good time to create a little blog.

Eventually, once all 150 signatures are in the book, it will be auctioned or even better, raffled with all of the money raised going to SENSE, a great charity for deafblind people, who (amongst other things) teach deafblind children and their parents how to communicate with each other.

The pattern for the display box.

I've got a few pages that are looking pretty full so far. This one is loaded with many of the heads of department that worked on VII, from the Art Department, SFX, Costume, Set Dec, Creatures, Construction and Props...

Many of the concept artists that I've managed to contact, who were unable to sign in person, have very kindly done some great little illustrations with their signatures, that have been mounted into the book. Here are a few examples...

PAGE 85

Doug Chiang (Concept Artist)

PAGE 95

Erik Tiemens (Concept Artist)

PAGE 241

Thom Tenery (Concept Artist)

This afternoon I managed to add Dave Filoni to my page of Star Wars Directors...

You get the picture. I've got a load of pages that I still need to pop up here and I'll be adding more as I collect the signatures. The hard part is still to come... getting the principles. Wish me luck.

About Me

I'm a freelance prop and model maker, now based in Australia, who primarily works in the film industry. I have worked as a prop maker on some great projects including 'Harry Potter', 'Gravity' and 'Edge of Tomorrow'. Most recently I've been working as an art department concept model maker and as a costume FX prop maker on the 'The Force Awakens', 'Rogue One', 'The Last Jedi' and 'Solo'